# Government can't keep UFOs a secret **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 15, 2005, 9:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462 "2005-04-15T09:36:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2005, 8:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462/21 "2005-04-19T08:51:37Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > Although he continued to hound-dog around, which ensured that it would eventually become public. And yet but for that amendment, I bet he’d be on his fourth term by now, which highlights another aspect of conspiracies; it often turns out that aside from a small vocal minority for whom the conspiracy becomes the central focus of their lives, oftentimes much of the public doesn’t care. ---
**Author:** ![guinnog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/7993a0/32.png) [@guinnog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guinnog)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2005, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462/22 "2005-04-19T15:37:22Z")
> [@Tuckerfan](#): > > Doesn’t matter. A drive system which can propel a ship FTL should be readily adaptable to powering a kinetic energy weapon which would have a destructive capability greater than any nuke. (Imagine a 1 oz rock slamming into the Kremlin at the speed of light. I doubt that there’d be much left of the commies.) Er… you might want to check, but I think Russia is run by nice oligarchs like Mr Putin nowadays. The commies have moved on now. AFAIK. ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2005, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462/23 "2005-04-19T15:44:10Z")
> [@guinnog](#): > > Er… you might want to check, but I think Russia is run by nice oligarchs like Mr Putin nowadays. > > The commies have moved on now. AFAIK. Yes, but the Roswell incident happened in 1947. Methinks that every top scientist in the country would have been “disappeared” in order to work on reverse engineering alien technology from that moment on. Given that the USSR didn’t collapse until nearly 5 decades later, I’d say that during the interviening years there’s good chance we’d have figured out a good way to vaporize them before they stopped bing commie-pinkos. ---
**Author:** ![gazpacho](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/6f9a4e/32.png) [@gazpacho](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gazpacho)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2005, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462/24 "2005-04-19T15:49:19Z")
> [@Tuckerfan](#): > > Doesn’t matter. A drive system which can propel a ship FTL should be readily adaptable to powering a kinetic energy weapon which would have a destructive capability greater than any nuke. (Imagine a 1 oz rock slamming into the Kremlin at the speed of light. I doubt that there’d be much left of the commies.) Tucker, Tucker, Tucker they put safe gaurds in the technology to keep it out of agreesive hands ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2005, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462/25 "2005-04-19T15:55:30Z")
> [@gazpacho](#): > > Tucker, Tucker, Tucker they put safe gaurds in the technology to keep it out of agreesive hands Yes, but one of the hardest things to do is to _invent_ a technology. Once someone else knows it can be done, it’s only a short matter of time before they’re able to duplicate it. So while, ET may have put safeguards to prevent Col. Flag from using the warp drive on the ship, Col. Flag can show it to the scientific community (all of whom have been forced to sign secrecy documents), who then cna puzzle it out the best they can. At this point, not only have you shown the eggheads that it’s possible, but you’ve eliminated a number of blind alleys for them to travel down. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2005, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462/26 "2005-04-19T18:46:19Z")
> [@guinnog](#): > > Er… you might want to check, but I think Russia is run by nice oligarchs like Mr Putin nowadays. > > The commies have moved on now. AFAIK. That’s what you think. And the Secret Order of Dagon was destoryed in an explosion at Red Hook, too. I’ve been to a number of those off-limits places (not the Area 51 area specifically, but to various parts of the Nellis Complex, including Tonopah and Nellis Test Ranges, which are maintained by the DoE) and while I’ve seen a few things **Not To Be Discussed** , none of them were extraterrestrial in origin, and in fact, nothing even as interesting as an atomic cocktail shaker. It seems to me that it is in the best interest of the DoE and the DoD to actually encourage fantastic tales and embellishments of phenomena seen in the area to conceal the true nature of ongoing systems tests. Reports of slow moving triangular craft were most likely the F-117A Nighthawk, which were based out of Nellis. If the government really had alien artifacts, it might be able to conceal the details about them, but it is very unlikely it could conceal convincing evidence or multiple independant confirmation of them. The B-2 and F117A programs were “deep black”, and yet there existance and a surprising number of details were known well in advance of the government’s acknowledgement. For a program to maintain absolute information security for two or more generations is beyond even the faintest plausibility. Believe what you like, but the scant and scruffy evidence of alien visitation doesn’t really hold up to inspection and analysis. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2005, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462/27 "2005-04-19T18:55:31Z")
> [@Stranger On A Train](#): > > If the government really had alien artifacts, it might be able to conceal the details about them, but it is very unlikely it could conceal convincing evidence or multiple independant confirmation of them. The B-2 and F117A programs were “deep black”, and yet there existance and a surprising number of details were known well in advance of the government’s acknowledgement. For a program to maintain absolute information security for two or more generations is beyond even the faintest plausibility. Believe what you like, but the scant and scruffy evidence of alien visitation doesn’t really hold up to inspection and analysis. > > Stranger IIRC, it was the model company Testors that came out with a model of a stealth fighter which looked almost _exactly_ like the F117, and they managed to figure it out by looking at the unclassified military procurement requests, and a few other things in plain sight. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2005, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462/28 "2005-04-19T21:17:29Z")
> [@Tuckerfan](#): > > If the government has captured UFOs where’s our FTL drives? Where’s our quantum computers? Same place they keep the cold fusion generator, the 100-mpg carburetor, the 500-miles-between-charges electric car and the Ark of the Covenant! 😉 ---
**Author:** ![gazpacho](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/6f9a4e/32.png) [@gazpacho](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gazpacho)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2005, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462/29 "2005-04-19T21:48:08Z")
> [@Tuckerfan](#): > > Yes, but one of the hardest things to do is to _invent_ a technology. Once someone else knows it can be done, it’s only a short matter of time before they’re able to duplicate it. So while, ET may have put safeguards to prevent Col. Flag from using the warp drive on the ship, Col. Flag can show it to the scientific community (all of whom have been forced to sign secrecy documents), who then cna puzzle it out the best they can. At this point, not only have you shown the eggheads that it’s possible, but you’ve eliminated a number of blind alleys for them to travel down. The aliens are very advanced. They can deploy technology without allowing it to be directed in ways that the don’t want. It is a lot like DRM for music and video now. Currently with our limited knowledge the record companies are having a hard time limiting their music to be used only in the ways that they want. But they are working on the problem. These are advance aliens they probably have good SSRM (space ship rights management). ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2005, 10:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462/30 "2005-04-19T22:01:50Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Same place they keep the cold fusion generator, the 100-mpg carburetor, the 500-miles-between-charges electric car and the Ark of the Covenant! 😉 Rosebuuuuuuud. 😛 Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2005, 10:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462/31 "2005-04-19T22:24:27Z")
> [@gazpacho](#): > > The aliens are very advanced. They can deploy technology without allowing it to be directed in ways that the don’t want. > > It is a lot like DRM for music and video now. Currently with our limited knowledge the record companies are having a hard time limiting their music to be used only in the ways that they want. But they are working on the problem. These are advance aliens they probably have good SSRM (space ship rights management). Meh, put me and a couple of other space geeks, along with a few computer programmers, with plenty of Sharpies, Dr Pepper, pizza, high speed net connection, and the complete works of Monty Python in a room with the thing, and we’ll be well on our way to Orion (looking for them hot green bitches) in about a month or so. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![commasense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/commasense/32/3017_2.png) [@commasense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/commasense)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2005, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462/32 "2005-04-20T01:49:20Z")
The government is actually very good at keeping secrets. For example, I’m sure none of you knew that George Bush isn’t really a human, but is actuall… HEY! WHO ARE YOU GUYS?!? WHAT ARE DOING??? IS THAT SOME KIND OF RAY GUN?? What do you… uuuhhhhhh… I was, uhh, just kidding. President Bush is a great guy. And you’re right. The government can’t keep secrets. There are no aliens. And no secret plans to suspend the constitution or declare Mr. Bush president for life. Oh, yes, and Social Security really is in trouble and needs to be overhauled right away. ---
**Author:** ![Astroboy14](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/df705f/32.png) [@Astroboy14](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Astroboy14)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2005, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462/33 "2005-04-21T16:02:35Z")
> [@Tuckerfan](#): > > Meh, put me and a couple of other space geeks, along with a few computer programmers, with plenty of Sharpies, Dr Pepper, pizza, high speed net connection, and the complete works of Monty Python in a room with the thing, and we’ll be well on our way to Orion (looking for them hot green bitches) in about a month or so. 😛 Not meaning to impugn your skills in any way, but I have to disagree. I think it likely that any alien artifacts we managed to get our grubby little hands on would be far more than a hundred years or so ahead of our technology. More likely, they’d be hundreds of thousands, if not millions of years ahead of us… give a TV to the best Neanderthal engineer ever, and I doubt he’d be able to reverse engineer _anything_ out of it. Assuming we have a crashed alien saucer, I think it’s more likely that the scientists are looking at it and saying, “Is THAT thing there the FTL drive? I dunno. Maybe it’s that roundish glowing thingy there…” ---
**Author:** ![kingpengvin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/9dc877/32.png) [@kingpengvin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kingpengvin)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2005, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462/34 "2005-04-21T17:49:58Z")
I dunno, I 'm not sure the neanderthal allusion works here. They were essentially unsophisticated stone workers who did not have a methodology for understanding their world beyond their essential needs (Improve your spear head, follow the path of food, find adequate shelter, breed and pass knowledge down to thwe little neandethals) If the TV doesn’t seem to be important to their immediate needs they would not bother to study how or why it works. Today’s science may be inferior to our fictional Space friends (who, by the way, were unable to prevent there uber technology from failing them) but the way in which we study is vastly different, we have methodology and a philospohy of learning. We would try to discover why something works even if only on a theoretical level. The way our backward scientists try to work is by looking at abstracts like why the technology is laid out the way it is or at least try to see the correllations between items that would aid in discovering how they work. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2005, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462/35 "2005-04-21T18:12:03Z")
Here’s what I don’t get. Exactly what BENEFIT does the Military-Industrial complex gain by keeping the existance of alien space craft secret? If they could reverse-engineer the technology, then it might make sense, so we could use our saucer-tech to kick the Russkis in the shorts without their knowledge. But if we could do that, then why haven’t we, or why didn’t we, do that? Where’s the saucer-tech? If we CAN’T reverse-engineer the saucer-tech, then the only other option is to try to develop our own saucer-tech independently. But to do that you need a budget. You need top men. TOP MEN. And whipping up a little fear and paranoia about the capabilities of the saucer-people would be just the ticket to ensure giant billowing cascades of government pork flowing to the saucer-tech research teams. Money, power, influence, all would be in the grasp of the saucer-secret-keepers, if only they would reveal the existance of the saucers and explain how they need tons and tons of cash, guns, and beautiful-yet-naive young receptionists to counter the threat of the saucer-men. I personally refuse to believe that government bureaucrats would be so selfish as to deny the country the benefit of their expertise. Their patriotic duty would be to go public and demand more money to solve problem. Power corrupts, and saucer-power corrupts sauceriffically. Nuff said. ---
**Author:** ![Astroboy14](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/df705f/32.png) [@Astroboy14](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Astroboy14)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2005, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462/36 "2005-04-21T19:18:09Z")
> [@kingpengvin](#): > > I dunno, I 'm not sure the neanderthal allusion works here. > > They were essentially unsophisticated stone workers who did not have a methodology for understanding their world beyond their essential needs (Improve your spear head, follow the path of food, find adequate shelter, breed and pass knowledge down to thwe little neandethals) If the TV doesn’t seem to be important to their immediate needs they would not bother to study how or why it works. OK, point taken. Let’s change the analogy, then: let’s give a fully fueled and armed F-117A to Archimedes and Pythagorus (yes, I know, they didn’t live at the same time). How much would they be able to reverse engineer from it? Would they even be able to figure out that it was a flying machine (assuming that they hadn’t seen it in flight, that is)? They also had a systematic way of investigating things; not nearly as advanced as our scientists today, of course. Or maybe that analogy is fatally flawed as well. My point, as I’m sure you already know, is that a piece of technology thousands or hundreds of thousands of years more advanced than ours would be indistinguishable from magic, and I don’t think even the most advanced scientists would be able to ferret much out of it. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2005, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462/37 "2005-04-21T19:27:05Z")
> [@Astroboy14](#): > > OK, point taken. Let’s change the analogy, then: let’s give a fully fueled and armed F-117A to Archimedes and Pythagorus (yes, I know, they didn’t live at the same time). How much would they be able to reverse engineer from it? Would they even be able to figure out that it was a flying machine (assuming that they hadn’t seen it in flight, that is)? John Campbell had a great editorial in the early '60s called _No Copying Allowed_ which examined what would happen if a then-current fighter showed up no 2,000 years ago but in WW I Europe. The same kind of problems. How would anyone back then know that a microprocessor driving the electronics was anything but a hunk of silicon. They didn’t even have the optics to see the wires, let alone understand how silicon probably chemically identical to their level of testing would do anything. They might be able to figure out that the plane was unstable - but they couldn’t figure out how a computer could keep it up. The only thing finding a UFO would tell us is that interstellar travel is practical. If it showed that FTL travel was possible, it would revolutionize physics as people tried to figure out how. But getting any hints from the hardware is unlikely. ---
**Author:** ![kingpengvin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/9dc877/32.png) [@kingpengvin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kingpengvin)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2005, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462/38 "2005-04-21T19:40:35Z")
The WWI anology is better at least they are an industrial society that have the basic understanding of manufactured goods and complex machinery. True they wouldn’t make head nor tails of the micro processors, but that isn’t the key technology that would interest them. The main piece would be the engine. They could reverse engineer that technology. There are bits and pieces from the over all technology that could be used and boost their understanding of science. The guidence system for the missle may take decades to work out but the rocket itself can be looked at and its prinicples used for a clumsy long range weapon surpassing Artillery of the time. Sure we wouldn’t understand everything on a UFO but so long as their physics follow many of teh same rules as ours we can see the principles behind some of the technology and use them. Of course you need a fully working model. If all we have is a giant crater and debris field then forget it. ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2005, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462/39 "2005-04-21T19:51:18Z")
More to the point, we have today a deep theoretical understanding of physics. Within just 300 years of trying we’re prtty close to figuring out how it basically works on a deep level - the real questions now are simply unanswered definitively, not unanswered period. We probably already know the principles behind alien spaceflight. We simply don’t know which of our principles is practical. Aside from that, we can probably scan almost anything they have in this universe if we wish. We can, if we wish, use ST electron microscopes, and even aliens with advanced tech probably don’t go deeper than those see. And even if they do, we’ll still learn much just figuring out the basics: do they use lubricant? what kind? etc. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2005, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462/40 "2005-04-21T20:01:35Z")
> [@kingpengvin](#): > > True they wouldn’t make head nor tails of the micro processors, but that isn’t the key technology that would interest them. The main piece would be the engine. They could reverse engineer that technology. There are bits and pieces from the over all technology that could be used and boost their understanding of science. > > The guidence system for the missle may take decades to work out but the rocket itself can be looked at and its prinicples used for a clumsy long range weapon surpassing Artillery of the time. Well, basically our rockets are not all that much different from what Goddard did. If the thing they found used liquid oxygen, they might have a bit of a problem. I suspect solid fuels have to be mixed to a level of purity and consistency unavailable then. For jets, the jet engine itself might be okay, unless the control systems were so essential that it was unusable without them. The concept of jets and rockets was well known then, the issue was engineering. If it took someone from WWI 90 years to figure it out, they wouldn’t be any better off, would they? Actually it would take less time, because knowing something is possible is half the battle. Campbell was reacting against the sf cliche of a human picking up an alien artifact and reverse engineering it in a matter of weeks. Ain’t going to happen. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/government-cant-keep-ufos-a-secret/299462.md?page=3)